


The Puppeteer

by PrincessBethoc



Category: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Family Feels, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-12
Updated: 2019-04-12
Packaged: 2020-01-12 05:58:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18440447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrincessBethoc/pseuds/PrincessBethoc
Summary: He might be gone, but still he lingers. In the night, in the dark, the puppeteer comes back to visit.Implied previous rape/non-con.





	The Puppeteer

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

That is all she can try to do.

Sometimes, in the darkest dead of the night, she could swear he lies there next to her. She feels his hands. She hears him breathe. She can do nothing beneath his stare.

He is in control. He is the puppeteer. He can do whatever he wants – she will comply.

She can’t understand why she cannot move. Bound to her bed, she tries to scream. Nothing comes out. She screams silence.

And then she remembers.

He’s gone.

He isn’t here.

She is at home.

Her sister is in the next room.

Her niece is only yards across the hall.

He cannot get her.

The puppeteer’s strings snap, one by one, freeing her limbs.

She tries to move her arms but they are tied down. Her legs are breeze blocks, too heavy to use. The puppeteer is gone but he has left her bound by his memory.

He no longer lies in bed with her, the puppeteer.

Her mind floats somewhere she cannot name; she is not unconscious but she does not feel she is awake either. There is no way to know whether she fights to move or if she dreams her own screams.

All she knows is she screams. She cannot hear her own screams.

She sees his shadow over her bed. The puppeteer. The man who binds the strings to her extremities. The man who decides who she must be.

And she screams. She cannot hear herself scream. Does anyone else hear her? Or is she silent to the world?

Those hands find her face. She wants to recoil. Every fibre of her body wants to recoil.

She can’t recoil.

That mouth finds her neck. She wants to scream. Her throat even contracts like she does scream.

She can’t scream.

He’s a murderer.

A liar.

A lunatic.

A misogynist.

An abuser.

A puppeteer.

He is hers. As much as she is his wife, he is her ghost. The phantom that haunts her in the night. In the dark.

She has never been afraid of the dark. Now it plays with her. It creates shapes and sounds. It holds her down. It gives him to her when she least wants him. It ties the strings around her limbs and returns all control over her to the puppeteer.

Light comes. Warm and faint, it burns through the strings.

“Aunt Zelda?” a young woman asks.

She cannot move. The strings are burned out, but the puppeteer still has his grip on her.

“Auntie? Are you okay? You were screaming!”

The girl stands where he had been standing. The girl outshines him. The girl is stronger than the puppeteer.

She manages to nod her head. The tears boil on her cheeks. Her throat stings – she really has been screaming.

The girl, her niece, climbs into the bed. Hugs her. Holds her. Keeps her free.

It will always be, won’t it, that the girl will banish the puppeteer?


End file.
